Immigration & Racism in Canada

Tune in to a discussion of Reasonable Accommodations (this is for immigrants not disability like in the U.S.) in Quebec to discuss racist recommendations from some Quebec provinces and the response to them across Canada.

Discussion of Canada as a Utopia has long forgotten the treatment of immigrants and the stereotypical depictions of African Americans in Canada as well as the general negative sentiment toward people of color and the GLBTQ community expressed openly in the largely rural and mining oriented regions of the nation.

It is important that even as we recognize the freedoms that Canadians have vis-avis N. America, we do not forget the real problems that exist in my second home. Saying it exists is the first step in coordinating efforts to turn back the racist tide impacting the Americas under the Bush regime and his neo-liberal policies for the region (the Americas and Canada and Mexico in particular) that among other things exacerbate existing racial and economic inequalities and create new, easily targetable, immigration populations.

As in N. America membership in supremacist groups is growing in Canada. Canadian membership in the largest Klan group in the Americas has grown over the past 6 years from 1 (down from considerably from its hey day in Canada 70 years ago) to 3500 nation wide. Their primary targets are First Nation People and Immigrants, their stated concerns include decline in the economy and a sense of displacement of white Canadians for immigrants and First Nation folk. I can personally attest to having had a frightening encounter with them three years ago in Ontario which sadly was rectified by a huge car wreck that rerouted traffic and kept us from being followed any further. I was never more grateful to see those Mounties at the Minnesota Border (and I am always grateful to see them because one of those Mounties is damn hot!).

Listen to an interview with Nazila Bettache of No One is Illegal Montreal on "Reasonable Accommodation" in Quebec. A governmental commission began last week in Canada, on the growing racism faced in Quebec by immigrants.

Immigrants in Quebec have faced a growing political storm throughout the past
year, as a Provincial debate on what is referred to as "reasonable
accommodation" has attracted international headlines.

A series of public hearings will occur throughout the coming months in Quebec,
as part of the state commission lead by two Quebec academics who are not new
immigrants. These government initiated take place within the context of growing
racism toward new immigrants in Quebec, a pattern of racism directly targeting
the Arab / Muslim community.

"Using the term accommodation simply put really, sort of implies to me a
hierarchy of identities, where by, the identity the one that has been framed in
the mainstream media as the so-called Quebcoies national identity," explains
Bettache within the interview.

Debate on immigration in Quebec reached extremes in the past year, when the
rural town of Herouxville passed a resolution which demanded that "new
arrivals, abandon the way of life from their countries of origin, as it cannot
be recreated" in Quebec. Civil liberties groups throughout Canada slammed the
resolution as racist.